[Iana-transition] What form of supervision is needed?

[John Curran]

On Oct 16, 2014, at 9:30 AM, Richard Hill <rhill at hill-a.ch> wrote:

> As far as I can tell, ICANN properly speaking does the following things with
> respect to IP addresses:
> 
> 1. Approves the creation of new RIRs
> 2. Ratifies the policies approved by the RIRs
> 
> And, through the IANA function, it does the following:
> 
> 3. Allocates top-level IP address blocks to the RIRs
> 4. Publishes those allocations on its web site
> 
> One could envisage transferring all those functions to the NRO, which would
> in effect mean that the RIRs would be supervising those functions.  Since
> the RIRs are responsible to their members, that would mean that the members
> of the RIRs would be supervising those functions.

Richard -

This is certainly possible, but it is worth noting that the NRO is a 
rather lightweight coordination function among the RIRs, allowing the 
RIRs to coordinate on matters such as "whether we'll have an joint RIR 
trade show booth at a given international conference", "can we work on 
one informational brochure on IPv4 runout/IPv6 rather than having five",
"can we have a single joint number resource statistics report", etc.  

In these cases, each RIR is fulfilling each existing mission and operating
plans, only coordinating with other RIRs to do so in a more efficient and
consistent manner.  Ultimately, each RIR acts under its own authority on
matters which are primarily outreach and operational in nature.

Expanding the NRO to take on the functions listed could be done, but would
represent a fairly substantial change in the level of responsibility, and
may need to be accompanied by both organizational changes (e.g. actually
incorporating the NRO) and accountability changes (e.g. more than simply 
to the RIR executive directors, as it is at present.)

If this approach were to be promoted, it would be good to have ample 
discussion on this list first, including the aspects noted above.

/John

John Curran
President and CEO
ARIN